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With what seems like forever, we have witnessed the ongoing and perpetual consolidation of the CAD industry as companies continue to get swallowed up by others. Some of the acquisitions have been successful and some, well, not so much. We’ve witnessed CAD companies acquiring CAD companies, simulation companies acquiring CAD companies, and other types of technical software and service companies acquiring CAD companies. With all the attention seemingly focused on the CAD side, it’s sometimes easy to forget that there also has been a significant consolidation through acquisition on the CAM side, as well the past several years. Let’s take a quick look at a few of these acquisitions as the CAM circle continues to get smaller.

Hexagon AB, a provider of design, measurement (metrology), and visualization technologies has acquired Vero Software, a provider of CAM software.

Hexagon AB is a global technology group headquartered in Sweden and was founded in 1992. The diverse provides products for designing, measuring, and positioning objects. Surveyors, government agencies, mapping companies, construction, and security and defense related industries are the primary customers of their services.

Although the following video doesn’t have an audio track, it does demonstrate one of Vero Software’s technologies, WorkNC, that is part of the acquisition by Hexagon.

WorkNC CADCAM and Vero Software – EMO Show 2013

One of the Hexagon’s main focuses is on precision measuring technologies and is divided into three business areas: Geospatial Measuring (Surveying and GPS), Industrial Metrology (Hexagon Metrology), and Technologies. The company markets its products and services under more than 35 different brands worldwide.

Hexagon’s macro products are used within construction and engineering industries, while micro products are used primarily by automotive and aerospace industries, medical industries and design industry. Hexagon’s other operations focus on supplying components primarily to the heavy automotive industry as well as key components for industrial robots.

Vero Software is a leader in CAD CAM software. Vero develops and distributes software for aiding design and manufacturing processes, providing solutions for the tooling, production engineering, sheet metal, metal fabrication, stone and woodworking industries. Several well-known brands in Vero Software’s portfolio brands include Alphacam, Cabinet Vision, Edgecam, Machining STRATEGIST, PEPS, Radan, SMIRT, SURFCAM, VISI, and WorkNC, along with the production control MRP system Javelin.

Despite the diversity of Vero’s applications, they all address the rising challenges of achieving manufacturing efficiencies.

The acquisition strengthens Hexagon’s software offerings, providing the means to close the gap of making quality data fully availableby extending the reach of the newly developed MMS (metrology planning software) to include CAM (manufacturing planning software).

Subject to regulatory approval, Vero Software will be fully consolidated as of August 2014.

This constant flow of acquisitions sure make for interesting times. For example, earlier this year CAE giant ANSYS acquired SpaceClaim, and now Hexagon acquires Vero. As much as anything, I think these acquisitions illustrate the desire for technical organizations to diversify when it makes sense for symbiotic relationships. Instead of trying to corner a market by acquiring all competitors, more and more technical software acquisitions seem to be happening with technologies that complement existing product offerings, not just expand similar lines of offerings.(more…)